Biometric verification and identification may be desirable for a number of business applications. For example, biometric verification at a point-of-sale terminal offers the possibility to reduce credit card fraud. A biometric characteristic of the purchaser can be compared with a biometric characteristic stored on the credit card. If there is a match, the transaction is authorized.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,432,864 to Lu et al. discloses a biometric verification approach wherein track 3 of a magnetic stripe on a credit card can be used to store so-called “Eigenface parameters”. The Eigenface parameters may be reduced to less than 100 bytes according to the patent. Unfortunately, the Eigenface parameters may not be sufficiently accurate in confirming the card bearer's identify.
Along those lines, U.S. Pat. No. 5,355,411 to MacDonald discloses storing on magnetic tracks, an electronic signature and user's portrait. U.S. Pat. No. 4,752,676 to Leonard et al. discloses comparing voice print information with stored data on a magnetic stripe. Again, such characteristics may not provide a sufficiently high accuracy rate to be practically used.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,995,086 to Lilley et al. discloses magnetic tracks on a plastic card that store fingerprint related data. The stored data is for a degree of correlation between a fingerprint of the authorized individual and a stored and selected reference signal image and the code number of this reference signal image. A fingerprint detection terminal with a sensor contains a memory win which the selected reference signal image is stored. The sensor compares the actual fingerprint of an individual to be checked with the corresponding reference signal image identified on the plastic card and stored in the fingerprint detection terminal. The determined degree of correlation is compared to the degree of correlation stored on the plastic card to determine if the person bearing the card is the authorized user. Unfortunately, the approach disclosed is fairly complicated and may lead to inaccuracy in terms of false acceptance and/or false rejection rates.